Stephan’s note: todays’s tip is brought to you a guest columnist, my friend Don Whitefield (www.jiujitsulife.com). Not only does he offer good advice for older BJJ players, but if young punks were to adopt some of the advice I guarantee they’d get better faster..

I don’t consider myself old at age fourty-two, but I know that my Jiu-Jitsu game differs a lot from the game of an eighteen year old. Anyone over thirty is considered either a Master or Senior in BJJ competition, and it is important for these students to understand the special rules that apply to them in order to make it to their black belt and beyond.

1. Rule: Roll Smart

Even if you feel like it don’t take the young spaz by the horns and get tossed around. Give them a little space to protect yourself, even if it means giving up position. Another good strategy is to stay on the top for a while or keep them in your guard (if you can) and tire them out to equalize the playing field a bit.

The most important advice is to avoid unusual positions unless you are positive that you can trust your training partner to look out for you. Often injuries occur when senior students get into unfamiliar position and they and/or their partner make a wrong move in the heat of battle resulting in injury. You have to be able to completely rely on your partner before you can open up your game.

2. Rule: Protect your body

I see teens and kids in my BJJ classes sometimes bend their joints at angles that make me shiver, but after the initial squeal they usually are back on the mat within five minutes. Their tendons and bones are flexible, but we loose this luxury as we age. The problem is that this occurs slowly and unnoticed and we sometimes spar as if we were still teenagers.

We become only aware of our age when we have (painfully) gone beyond the flexibility of our body. Since our recovery time is a lot longer than five minutes try to follow this simple rule we have in my academy: “Tap today, train tomorrow”. It reminds you to tap early even if you are not in a submission but just get caught awkwardly.

3. Rule: Recover smartly

It is sad that as teenagers we got away with 4 hours of sleep, eating only fried foods and sugary carbonated drinks. As you get older these sins will catch up with you, so change these habits if you still live that way. As a senior jiu-jitsu fighter you should get lots of sleep, water, protein, fruits, veggies and supplements; these will help you stay in the game (or get back into it if you get injured).

Be smart and recognize when you are injured: take the week off than have the injury turn chronic. Stretch every day to maintain your body’s flexibility. It protects you while you roll and helps you to overcome injuries much faster. Once you return to the mats don’t hesitate to point out your injury to your training partner so he can look out for you if necessary. Get medical advice early on if you get an unfamiliar injury, read up on it and educate yourself regarding recovery and prevention of these injuries.

Lastly, use your maturity and your ability to keep your cool as an advantage to prevent injuries, recover from them and protect yourself from future injuries. There is one good thing about not being a teenager anymore: You got a lot smarter since.

My newsletter last week about grappling with an aging body generated a fair bit of feedback. Some respondents thanked me for the article (you’re welcome). Others called me a candy-ass and that I should work harder and complain less (they were joking, I think).

A few shared their own experiences and lessons learned, and I think it worthwhile to share these insights with the Grapplearts readership. In particular I encourage ‘younger’ readers (ie under 35) to pay attention to this stuff: first of all Father Time will catch up with you too, and secondly, most of this advice will make you a better grappler regardless of how old you are.

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Jimmy Thompson had this to say:

I have been training in martial arts for over 25 years. i Started Karate at the age of 6, where they put alot of stress on static stretching, and i started BJJ in 1996. I became very flexible, too flexible…I ended up having five knee surgeries before the age of 30! I currently train BJJ 4 days a week, boxing & kickboxing 3 times a week and submission grappling 2 times a week!

The reasons that i have been able to keep up this type of schedule is because i have learned a few things over the years!

1: NO SWEATING = NO STRETCHING! Stay away from static stretching before a brisk warm up. in fact, warm up harder, stretch after class. You gain more benefits from stretching when you are warm and it speeds up your recovery!

2: LISTEN TO YOUR BODY! Somedays are meant to be either days off or more of a mental work out. Don\’t get caught up in being “a badass”, it’s counter productive. Alot of us used to be able to go hard all of the time, face the facts, your OLD!

3: STAY AWAY FROM STRONG NEW GUYS! Until they can control themselves, don\’t try to do it for them!

4: HEAL UP FIRST! Small injuries can get to be not so “small” if you don’t take the time to let them heal! so many times I see people come back “half recovered”, back rolling hard…only to repeat the injury again and again! I have to say that this is the most important when it comes to neck and other spine injuries!

5: BE BASIC! The fundamentals that you learned in your first year, or so, are usually your best bet. Continue to increase the amount of time that you spend in each position, merely making things tight! Make it a game of inches, take it down to halves of inches, eights of inches, etc…pressure, pressure, pressure! Not, go, go, go…take away the space and you take away the speed! One thing i remember when i was about 19 years old was the amount of pressure that Rigan Machado put on me when he was in side control, i wanted to tap! He didn’t move fast or work hard, he took what i gave him, and took away all of my space with pure basics!

These are the rules that I follow & I am very rarely hurt. Well, I’m always hurt, rarely injured!

Roll safe!

Jimmy Thompson
T-Town MMA
www.ttownmma.com
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Martin W. shares 6 secrets he uses to remain competitive in his fourties:

1. I fight differently than I used to. New guys waste a lot of energy. I can get someone in my guard quickly and they will expend far more energy trying to pass than I will keeping them in.
2. I am extremely cautious in allowing myself to get in a compromised position and having to work extra hard to get out. I will scramble hard to prevent someone from getting side control or mount. I fight really hard during the scramble, then lower my rpm’s at different points in the fight.
3. I close my eyes a lot when I fight. There are many times during a 6 minute sparring session where I am extremely relaxed and keeping my eyes closed makes me very relaxed. It is something I just shut off and on. During a fast, short and tough scramble for position, I am 110% going hard with my eyes open. But when we are tied up, and we are both fighting for minute, tiny advantages my eyes are closed. I fight kind of on and off the whole time. It is also unnerving to an opponent. They don’t know if you are tired, or playing possum, or on drugs.
4. My strategy is different. I have found that a lot of guys work hard to get the mount, then they don’t really know what to do once they get there. Or they can’t keep it very well, or their armbar attempts are lousy. Sometimes I won’t worry that much about an aggressive guy fight for the mount. He fights like the mount is the ultimate goal. I let him get it, then reverse him. The guy works really hard to get the mount and uses all hisenergy.
5. You are right about sleep. It is crucial. I try not to overtrain. I try to train 3 times a week, jog and lift a little once or twice a week and take off once or twice a week according to how I feel.
6. Stretching. I stretch every morning and every night. Many times during the day also when I am working on the computer. I find that stretching the legs and hips are the most beneficial. I am constantly working to try and do the splits, some days are really close, then other days, not so close. It’s funny, all animals naturally stretch, but a lot of people don’t. It helps circulation, flexibility, makes wrestling easier, and can really help prevent injury.

That’s it. That’s my two cents.

-Martin Walker

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Eric G. talks about preventing joint problems:

I am 43 years old and have been involved in martial arts for over 21 years – the past 10 in BJJ. I have developed arthritis in my right hip due to injuries that I didn’t take care of, and until recently I sparred hard every training session (3x a week). I have lost a great deal of flexibility and comfort in my right hip, so, I am re-learning BJJ with a handicap. The hip problem not only effects my injured hip but my other hip and back. Putting my socks on in the morning is a challenge now. It’s not something I wish on anyone.

I did karate for ten years which involved a lot of leg work, so, my muscles around my hip stayed strong. My only workout for the past several years has been BJJ (and I have been stuck in desk job) and I use to think that BJJ was a great workout, but it has some problems on maintaining overall muscle development. I am learning this the hard way.

For hip therapy, I am seeing a chiropractor once a week for PT and a doctor every three weeks for Prolotherapy. As result of the therapy, I have come to realize that I have allowed some muscles to atrophy to the point that the joints have become loose which in turn allowed the hip joint injury which lead to the arthritic problems.

Some things I would recommend to all martial art practitioners, of any age, to ward off joint problems are:

1. Warm up and stretch lightly before each practice or exercise session.
2. Do some kind of strength training that keeps all the muscles strongalong with your training.
3. Do a complete and thorough stretch immediately following practice or exercise.
4. Don’t overtrain.
5. If it hurts, don’t work it out and seek the advice of a trainedhealth professional.

To the young guys, I say injuries are cumulative, so, don’t let being young lull you into thinking you won’t have problems later if you injure something now. The neglect you show today will haunt you tomorrow.

Eric G.

The following question was submitted by a subscriber of the Grapplearts newsletter.

Q: What are your views on the ‘aging grappler’ who tries to keep rolling into his thirties and forties? What are some limitations and injuries to watch out for?

A: As an ‘aging grappler’ myself (at thirty seven years old) this is a topic near to my heart. I have found that I can work out just as hard as when I was young, but that it takes longer to recover from a tough workout. Recovery is heavily affected by hormones, and an older grappler just doesn’t have as high levels of testosterone, growth hormone and other hormonal factors to recover as fast as some twenty-year-old punk.

So what is a thirty, forty or fifty-something grappler to do? As I prepare to rattle off some suggestions I am reminded of the old joke which goes: “take my advice, I’m not using it”. If I followed my own advice rigorously then I’d be in bed right now preparing for tomorrow’s training session rather than typing this newsletter…

1 – Don’t train hard every class, especially if you are training often. If each sparring session is a battle to the death then you won’t recover in time for your next class. If you are always compounding incomplete recovery with more incomplete recovery, then overtraining, injury and illness become certainties, not possibilities.

2 – Pay attention to recovery, especially after harder training sessions. One reason that pro fighters and other young whelps can train so much is that they usually have the luxury of sleeping in, as well as taking naps during the day. This added sleep is a surefire way to recovering faster from workouts.

Now I realize that people with full time jobs and/or family obligations are unlikely to be able to sleep 9+ hours a night, and take naps whenever they are tired. At the very least try to get somewhere around 8 hours of sleep when you are training hard.

Pre and post exercise nutrition is also a huge factor in muscle recovery. A sportsdrink right before you work out, and a protein-carb drink immediately afterwards, willhelp you recover faster.

3 – Accept that you are in it for the long haul, and that there will be good days and bad days, hard days and easy days. The performance of older athletes isn’t determined by how hard they train on a given day, but rather by the cumulative results of years of training.

4 – Consider doing some weight training once or twice a week, IF you can do it without overtraining. Careful weightlifting can help prevent injuries by strengthening muscles, ligaments and bones, and less injuries mean faster improvement on the mat.

5 – Take inspiration from the athletes who have performed at incredibly high levels at age 40+. Randy Couture is an obvious example, becoming the UFC’s Light-Heavyweight Champion at age 40. Fred Hatfield was the first man to squat a mind-boggling 1000 pounds, and he did it at fourty-five years of age!

6 – Remember that strength and endurance are finite, but that there is no end to technique. High levels of technique CAN overcome youthful energy and enthusiasm, so ask questions, analyze deeply and study hard.